Go Bananas for Bananas

September 21, 2007

There’s a lot to love about bananas: They are…

Portable. With a naturally thick skin, bananas keep fresh even if they find their way to the bottom of your briefcase. However, a banana will ripen faster in hot and dark places, so don’t do this unless you like your bananas mushy and well-ripened.

Athlete’s food. Potassium is great for athletes of any kind and bananas are a good, compact source of carbohydrates. Cyclists can carry them and runners can enjoy bananas even in the middle of a long race.

Versatile. Eat bananas by themselves, sliced on cereal, with peanut butter on toast, in a smoothie or in banana bread.

Nutritious. Everyone thinks of potassium when they think of bananas, but bananas also contain a significant amount of vitamin C, B6, folate, magnesium, iron and copper. A medium banana, seven to eight inches long, has 105 calories and three grams of fiber with 27 grams of carbohydrates.

Produced by ADA’s Public Relations Team and ADA National Spokesperson Tara Gidus, MS, RD, LDN, CSSD